Where did the object come from?

Question

In the movie Chronicle, the 3 main characters stumble upon a large crystalline object which somehow grants them the power of telekinesis. They find this thing at the bottom of a strange hole. Where did it originate? Was that supposed to be a crater from it falling from space? Was it somehow made on Earth, and then lost there?

Answer 1

This wasn't specified anywhere in the movie, and I think it was meant to be left vague. It's irrelevant to what the movie is trying to do - show Andrew's rise and fall, and the conflict between him and Matt. I, for one, really appreciated the fact that no explanations were offered.

Answer 2

While the origin of the object was not made clear in the movie, (almost nothing is developed in any way) there are some clues that tell me it was NOT of extraterrestrial origin. I am not sure the delivery of the object to that town wasn't intentional in an effort to engage in limited human trials with acceptable losses.

• Why was the military able to find it so quickly? The only way they would have been able to show up as fast as they did, was if they expected the object and knew where it might land. Didn't that strike anyone else as a little suspicious?
• Why did they cover it up? If it wasn't important, no one would have made an effort to make it "disappear." Since they did, they must have had some idea of what was possible and wanted to prevent unnecessary exposure to the object. Three test subjects might have been considered "enough." On the other hand, they may not have had any idea someone had been exposed so soon and to what extent.
• Collecting the object was only the start of the need to create disinformation After the final meltdown in the city square, there would have been a need to "debrief the town and collect all the video footage in the name of "national security." It makes sense they would try and find the young men who were exhibiting those abilities as well.
• Unlikely coincidence: It seems very strange that an alien device would drop down from space, created by an unknown species and create beneficial mutations in human beings giving them incredible psycho-kinetic abilities in a matter of days. Perhaps the potential was always within us, but it seems more likely that a human agency would want to exploit that ability and create a technology to release it, than a random extraterrestrial.

Notice what terrific living weapons those young men would have turned out to be. Powers of flight, telekinetic shielding (remember the fork?) telekinesis and depending on the facility with the power, remote control of machines or vehicles. Could you imagine ten, one hundred or one thousand such soldiers? This is assuming of course, the psychotic potential could be isolated and removed early from the troops?

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I realize the real issue of this movie is not who caused the powers but the corrupting effect those powers had on these three young men. This was about power and how humans, particularly young humans with still developing morals might use these powers and the unfortunate consequences of that usage. As far as the writers were concerned back-story is non-existent and 83 minutes didn't leave much room or time for anything great, anyway.